Can someone tell me if this is a problem?

I recently got an IBM thinkpad, and it's alll good in the hood except for 1 thing. I noticed that the cooling fan only seems to go on for about a minute when I first turn the computer on, but then stays off after that...is this going to be a problem? The bottom of the laptop does seem to get a bit warm after a while, and I know this is supposed to happen to some extent, but will keeping my computer on for an extended period of time hurt it in any way?

 

it doesn't seem like a problem, most BIOS have a place in them where you can set them to turn off at a certain processor/mobo temperature

 

My laptop (Dell Latitude) gets really warm too on the bottom but the fan comes one when it gets exceptionally warm and it stays on for about 5 minutes, usually if it keeps happening I'll turn it off for a while but yeah you should be able to edit the settings in the BIOS.

 

OK I'm not as worried now...thanks!